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Government Run by Crooks?

a private developer in New York wants to build a $4.9 billion dollar pro-basketball arena smack in the middle of a residential neighborhood in Brooklyn. In order to do so, residents of that neighborhood are being evicted on grounds that the neighborhood has been “blighted”, a precedent set by the infamous case Kelo v. The City of New London (2005). Needless to say, the residents of the neighborhood believe they are being unfairly evicted and took their complaints to the New York Supreme Court.
After nearly six years of battling developer Bruce Ratner, the neighbors received a final hit this week as the Supreme Court handed down its decision. As was reported in the New York Daily News, judges gave the Atlantic Yards arena project the go-ahead on Monday (March 1).

Though the tenants technically have a few months before they have to be out of their apartments and condos, Ratner announced that he plans on breaking ground as early as March 11. But the residents refuse to go quietly. One tenant exclaimed, “It feels like I live in a state run by crooks!” To some New Yorkers, however, the greatest loss is not the residential property, but Freddy’s Bar and Backroom – rated one of the Best Bars in Brooklyn by the New York Times and Esquire – which also sits smack in the middle of Ratner’s targeted area for development.

Ratner, whose partners in the venture include rapper Jay Z and the Russian billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov, stands to pocket hundreds of millions of dollars on the deal, all thanks to the brute force of the state.

These types of elaborate developer deals continue to grow at the cost and frustration of American citizens...

The workers and patrons of Freddy's, however, are not going gentle into that good night. They've pledged to engage in civil disobedience and chain themselves to the bar when the bulldozers and wrecking balls come for their favorite haunt. A state sentator has even declared that she'll lay down in front of the demolition machinery.

do i have a choice? do YOU? neither of us has the power, the money, or station in life to actually be able to do something. the governent coerces us every day

My grandfather fought Eminent Domain. We were able to keep SOME of our land. Because the community he lived in stood up WITH him, supported his battle. It's people like you the government is hoping for...